“Yes. It’s been a cacklin’ all through the afternoon and evenin’—especial loud just as the sun wor settin’. I niver know’d it do that ’ithout plenty o’ wet comin’ soon after.”
Ryecroft’s interest is aroused, and for the moment forgetting his misery, he says:—
“You’re talking enigmas, Jack! At least they are so to me. What is this barometer you seem to place such confidence in? Beast, bird, or fish?”
“It be a bird, Captain? I believe the gentry folks calls it a woodpecker; but ’bout here it be more generally known by the name heequall.”
The orthography is according to Jack’s orthoepy, for there are various spellings of the word.
“Anyhow,” he proceeds, “it gies warnin’ o’ rain, same as a weather-glass. When it ha’ been laughin’ in the mad way it wor most part o’ this day, you may look out for a downpour. Besides, the owls ha’ been a-doin’ their best, too. While I wor waiting for ye in that darksome hole, one went sailin’ up an’ down the backwash, every now an’ then swishin’ close to my ear and giein’ a screech—as if I hadn’t enough o’ the disagreeable to think o’. They allus come that way when one’s feelin’ out o’ sorts—just as if they wanted to make things worse. Hark! Did ye hear that, Captain?”
“I did.”
They speak of a sound that has reached their ears from below—down the river.
Both show agitation, but most the waterman; for it resembled a shriek, as of a woman in distress. Distant, just as one he heard across the wooded ridge, on that fatal night after parting with Mary Morgan. He knows now, that must have been her drowning cry, and has often thought since whether, if aware of it at the time, he could have done aught to rescue her. Not strange, that with such a recollection he is now greatly excited by a sound so similar!
“That waren’t no heequall; nor screech-owl neyther,” he says, speaking in a half whisper.